Table of contents for December 10, 2018 in TIME Magazine

AS A COLD SPELL SETTLED ACROSS PARTS OF the U.S. over the Thanksgiving holiday, President Donald Trump took to Twitter with a question he shouldn’t need to ask: “Whatever happened to Global Warming?” he mused on Nov. 21. Two days later, scientists working for 13 agencies across his Administration gave Trump a stark reminder. The climate—which, despite the President’s question, is not the same thing as the daily weather—remains very much in peril, and its warming threatens the welfare of the U.S. That finding, which came as part of a long-planned and congressionally mandated report, underscores the reality of climate change during the Trump presidency. The President may not “believe” in climate change or understand the science behind it, but he cannot control its political, economic and scientific consequences.…

3 U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan On Nov. 27, a roadside bomb killed three American soldiers and wounded three more in the province of Ghazni, in the deadliest attack on U.S. troops in Afghanistan this year; the Taliban claimed responsibility. In total, 13 Americans have died in combat in Afghanistan in 2018. Search called off for man killed by tribe Indian officials announced their decision not to retrieve the body of John Allen Chau, an American Christian missionary killed by tribespeople when he landed on the isolated North Sentinel island on Nov. 17. Rights groups say contact with outsiders could put the Sentinelese at risk of contracting potentially deadly illnesses. Republican wins runoff in Mississippi GOP incumbent Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith defeated Democrat Mike Espy in a Nov. 27 special…

DIED Magician and actor Ricky Jay, who was once called the world’s “most gifted sleight-of-hand artist,” on Nov. 24 at 72. ▷ Stephen Hillenburg, the marine-biology teacher who created the SpongeBob SquarePants children’s show, on Nov. 26 at 57. He announced last year that he had Lou Gehrig’s disease. ▷ José Peralta, the first Dominican American elected to the New York state senate, on Nov. 22 at 47, after a brief illness. Peralta, who represented part of Queens, lost his re-election bid in September. ELECTED Kristine Guillaume, as the first black woman to lead the Harvard Crimson, one of America’s oldest college newspapers. DEPARTED The first of 8,300 Cuban doctors, from Brazil, after their government ordered them to return home when Brazil’s far-right President-elect Jair Bolsonaro said he’d change…

The relationship between Britain and the U.S. has been “special” for many years. But Brexit will give us a once-in-a-generation opportunity to raise it to a new level. Once the U.K. leaves the E.U. on March 29, we will able to set an independent trade policy covering all aspects of goods and services. And among our first priorities is a deal with the U.S. With our shared history and mutual economic interests, we are in a position to set the global benchmark for how two leading, open and mature economies can trade with each other. We can revolutionize the rules on the digital economy. We can unleash the economic power of data flowing freely across borders. We can lead the world on emerging technologies like AI and the Internet…

Picture a young Candice Bergen look-alike—gorgeous and sophisticated—lounging in a dim, velvety boudoir. She lives in London, where she runs her own design studio. She’s in her 30s and globe-trots. She has the accent of her English father, and her life is informed by the lavish trips she took as a child with her French mother to Paris, Milan and New York City. This is Victoria, the imaginary creator of Victoria’s Secret. At least as corporate employees have been told over the years to envision her: a worldly woman who loves lingerie and is passionate about helping women feel sexy. Customers may not know her back-story, but they should be drawn to her glamour as they walk through the stores. She’s the reason for that sultry British accent in…

Hailed as a national treasure in Britain, Colman is emerging as a global star with two royal roles: first she stars as the tempestuous Queen Anne in The Favourite, then next year, she will take over for Claire Foy as Queen Elizabeth II on Netflix’s The Crown. Real royalty is rarely treated with irreverence. Did that attract you to The Favourite ? I loved that the film was done with the proper sexual urges. Just because they have on different clothes doesn’t mean they didn’t love and lose and swear at each other, just as we do now. What drew you to the role of Queen Anne? I loved that she had every emotion under the sun every five minutes. That’s an actor’s dream. She’s spoiled,…

WHEN I FIRST LEARNED THAT MICHELLE OBAMA was writing a memoir, one word emerged from the depths of my gut: No! That reaction came from a protectiveness conceived on Nov. 4, 2008, in my childhood home in Jackson, Miss. The election results had confirmed the impossible—America was getting its first black President. My mom paced, shouting her thanks to God. My 90-year-old grandmother cried. Gunshots sounded outside, which wasn’t unusual—but this time they were followed by shouts of joy. I watched in pure disbelief as the four Obamas appeared on television, our incoming First Family, and even more than that, our first black First Family. Then, for eight years, I watched as everything from the First Lady’s facial expressions to her physique were used to either make her an…

‘I wish that we [could] become a country embracing the people who chose us.’ PAMELA HARDER, Cropseyville, N.Y. AMERICAN LIKE ME The immigrant experience informed reader reaction to Viet Thanh Nguyen’s essay, about growing up in the U.S. as a Vietnamese refugee, in the Nov. 26/Dec. 3 issue. On Twitter, @anu_par described “straddling two worlds” as American and Indian, and was glad the piece offered “the space to be both.” But Dr. Chuc Pham of Forsyth, Ga., was saddened by his fellow Vietnamese refugee’s critical eye toward their adopted home: “Next time Mr. Nguyen wonders which America he lives in, he should instead wonder which American he wants to be.” Meanwhile, the cover image’s diverse recasting of Norman Rockwell’s Freedom of Worship left Earl Martin of Harrisonburg, Va.,…

FOUR DECADES AFTER THE VICIOUS EXTERmination led by Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime killed 1.7 million people—a fifth of the country’s population—and harmed countless others, some justice is finally being served. On Nov. 16, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), a hybrid bench of Cambodian and foreign prosecutors, found former regime leaders Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan guilty of genocide against the ethnic Vietnamese from 1975 to 1979; Nuon Chea was also convicted of genocide against the Cham people. The ruling marked the first time the U.N.-backed Cambodian tribunal has handed down the notoriously elusive verdict of genocide. It may also be the last. The decision recalled the lofty goals of the ECCC, which was established in 2003 and lauded as a model for postconflict reconciliation. The…

IT’S HARD TO IMAGINE THERE COULD EVER BE ANOTHER FILMmaker as big and bold, as willing to take thematic and visual risks, as Bernardo Bertolucci, who died on Nov. 26 at 77. He wove meaning and beauty into the fabric of a movie, and the results were a cloth of gold. His career was a grand, extravagant sweep—one freighted with its share of controversy. Last Tango in Paris, the filmmaker’s most famous and most infamous film, is both great and problematic. Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider play strangers who embark on an affair that exposes how humans use sex to erase the self. For years after its 1972 release, even people who wouldn’t go near it heard about the rape sequence that is the story’s turning point; before she…

Loved ones, in a new light For most of photographer Pat Martin’s life, addiction divided his family. But as they’ve reunited, he has found that creating a family photo album helped ease past pain. He told TIME’s Julia Zorthian, “I can look at these images and they show me a different side of things.” When the U.S. sought a king In 1786, the president of the Continental Congress invited a Prussian prince to lead America, recounts Richard Hurowitz. But he declined, believing the citizens would not accept a new monarch. Hurowitz says the U.S. would do well to remember those early lessons. Making new friends when you’re older As he grew into middle age, Ross McCammon, author of the book Works Well With Others, found that he’d experienced a…

FOR MANY, THE PHRASE PHYSICAL ACTIVITY conjures sweaty runs or powerlifting sessions at the gym. But the latest federal guidelines support a much broader definition of what it means to be active: one that includes less obvious pursuits like taking the stairs, raking leaves and even bird-watching. This subtle shift in messaging may even help Americans live longer, experts say. The new federal physical-activity guidelines were updated in November for the first time since 2008, and they still urge adults to do 75 minutes of vigorous (or 150 minutes of moderate) aerobic activity each week, plus muscle-strengthening sessions like weight lifting or yoga twice a week. But only 23% of Americans do so, and a recent study found that a quarter of American adults sit for more than eight…

1977 Roy Raymond opens Victoria’s Secret in Palo Alto, Calif. He grows the business and launches a catalog before selling it in 1982 for $1 million. 1986 Les Wexner, chairman of parent company The Limited, grows the chain to 100 locations, chipping away at department-store sales. 1993 The Miracle Bra, the company’s line of push-up bras, debuts in stores and will go on to challenge competitors like Playtex’s Wonderbra. 1995 Victoria’s Secret kicks off its annual Fashion Show. Four years later, it streams live on the Internet. Ratings for the show have dropped dramatically in recent years. 1996 Victoria’s Secret builds out standalone retail stores to sell popular bath products and cosmetics. 1997 The company launches its iconic Angels line. Winged supermodels appear in the Fashion…

Life had finally started coming together for 28-year-old Sandra Bland when, in 2015, Texas state trooper Brian Encinia pulled her over for failing to signal. Bland, a black woman from a Chicago suburb, had just moved south to work at her alma mater, Prairie View A&M. But she never had the chance to launch her career. Encinia apprehended her on dubious charges of assaulting an officer, and she was found hanging in her Waller County jail cell just three days later. Though Bland’s death was eventually ruled a suicide, the hashtag #SayHerName and infuriating viral dashcam footage of her arrest kept her in the news. The documentary Say Her Name: The Life and Death of Sandra Bland, which airs Dec. 3 on HBO, continues that tragic story. Directors Kate…

North of Dawn, the 13th novel from Nuruddin Farah, follows the lives of an expat Somali couple, Mugdi and Gacalo, who have lived in Oslo for years. Despite assimilating handily and raising their children in a mostly secular setting, their only son Dhaqaneh returns to Somalia as a jihadi and ends his life in a suicide attack. In fulfillment of a promise, Gacalo and Mugdi fly Dhaqaneh’s widow and children to live under their protection in an environment that proves strange and sometimes hostile for a family with competing values. Farah, a Somali literary lion, has been described as “the most important African novelist to emerge in the past 25 years” by the New York Review of Books. With the inclusion of real events, including the 2011 Oslo massacre,…

Your new film, They Shall Not Grow Old, uses technology to restore old footage from World War I. How is it different from other war documentaries? I’ve seen documentaries that use the same footage we do from the archives of the Imperial War Museum in England. But because the footage is so damaged, you’re seeing the soldiers through the fog of time. They’ve always been these sort of Charlie Chaplin figures, grainy and scratchy. When I saw our film—colorized, stabilized, slowed down—it’s like blowing away that fog. These men filmed 100 years ago suddenly came alive. You restored over 100 hours of film taken on the Western Front. What state was it in when you got it? A lot of archive footage is third generation;…

‘It’s transactional, it’s not personal.’MIA LOVE, Utah Republican Congresswoman, on her party’s relationship with minority voters; in a Nov. 26 concession speech, Love, who is black, named that dynamic as a factor in her re-election loss ‘EUROPE NEEDS TO GET A HANDLE ON MIGRATION BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT LIT THE FLAME.’HILLARY CLINTON, former U.S. Secretary of State, arguing in an interview with the Guardian that policies welcoming migrants have fueled right-wing populism ‘This is the right deal for Britain.’ THERESA MAY, U.K. Prime Minister, defending her proposed Brexit deal before the House of Commons ‘After signing the plea agreement, Manafort committed federal crimes by lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Special Counsel’s Office on a variety of subject matters.’ ROBERT S. MUELLER, special counsel investigating Russian…

WHEN GENERAL MOTORS ANNOUNCED ON Nov. 26 that it was halting production at five factories and cutting 15% of its workforce, the news came as a major blow not only to autoworkers but also to President Donald Trump, whose economic agenda was built on the promise that he would bring manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. The layoffs also suggested something broader: economic instability that extends well beyond a single company, as automakers face rising tariffs, declining sales and changing consumer habits. CHANGING GEARS GM’s announcement left manufacturing cities reeling. The company says it will halt production at plants in Lordstown, Ohio; Detroit and Warren, Mich.; White Marsh, Md.; and Ontario, Canada. It will also lay off more than 14,000 workers, including 25% of its executives. The changes come…

ALASKAN RELICS In May, Germany returned nine indigenous items taken from graves in southwest Alaska. The artifacts—brought to Berlin in the 1880s—include two broken masks, a child’s cradle and a wooden idol. INDIAN IDOLS The Met in NYC announced in August an agreement with India to send back a 3rd century figure of a male deity and an 8th century statue of a Hindu goddess. The objects had been donated in 1986 and 2015 respectively. BENIN BRONZES In October, the British Museum agreed to lend part of a set of valuable bronze sculptures back to Nigeria. The British army plundered the bronzes in 1897 from Benin City, in what is now southern Nigeria.…

NICOLAS ROEG WAS UNLIKE anyone else, and a genius at what he did. A lot of directors leave you to your own devices, but when we worked together on The Witches, Nic—who died at 90 on Nov. 23—knew exactly what he wanted. It hadn’t occurred to me that a witch in a children’s movie should be sexy. Nic’s attitude was “Whyever not?” An adult who could dream like a child, he had no tolerance for propriety and dull stuff like that. And I always remember his encouragement. I had hellish makeup that took six hours to put on, and once after a long day in latex filming a very wordy scene, I was stressed and starting to lose the lines. Nic showed me something to do with the wig…

OVER THE PAST DEcade, Europe has faced two existential turning points: a sovereign debt crisis triggered by the 2008–09 U.S. financial market meltdown and the surge in migrants that followed the Arab Spring and the Syrian civil war. It’s hard to imagine how either might have been managed without German Chancellor Angela Merkel. She faced her share of (sometimes deserved) criticism along the way. But Merkel’s toughness, resilience and endurance helped hold the European Union together through these unprecedented challenges. Yet her political moment is nearing an end. Merkel’s bailouts for financially vulnerable countries like Greece, and especially her decision to open Germany’s borders to more than 1 million refugees, have eroded her popularity at home. After a series of disappointing election results for Merkel’s center-right Christian Democratic Union…

Be a homebody You don’t need to leave the house to get in meaningful movement. Cleaning, making household repairs, raking leaves and even cooking a meal count as physical activity. Park far away Walking is linked to health benefits like lower body weight and blood pressure, better mental health and a longer life, so rack up extra steps by choosing a distant spot. Go dancing Dancing can burn up to 300 calories every half hour, and research has linked it to an increase in white matter in the brains of older adults, which tends to degrade with age. Explore the outdoors Gardening, nature walks and bird-watching all come with built-in movement. (Birds, unlike humans, don’t sit around much.) Just being outside brings other benefits too, like…

HE MADE IT ALL APPEAR SO EASY. THE FEAR, THE hate, the insecurity in Europe started to seem like petty problems when Sebastian Kurz, the Chancellor of Austria, was on the stage in his hometown of Vienna, looking more like a class president in front of his high school reunion than a man who casts himself as Europe’s last best hope. It was Oct. 13, almost exactly a year since Kurz had won the elections in Austria at the age of 31, becoming the youngest Chancellor in the country’s history, as well as the youngest democratic leader anywhere in the world. To mark the anniversary, he gathered a few hundred friends and fans in Vienna for a modest celebration. No music, no colored lights. Just the friendly new face…

What binds a family? Does it have to be blood, or is love enough? Those are just a few of the questions Hirokazu Kore-eda asks in his tender, beautifully crafted Shoplifters, which won the top prize at Cannes this year. Husband and wife Osamu and Nobuyo (Lily Franky and Sakura Ando) head up a makeshift clan crowded together in a ramshackle house. Even though both are employed—he’s a day laborer in construction, she works at a laundry—the family barely squeaks by. And so Osamu has trained the couple’s young adoptive son, Shota (Jyo Kairi), in the felonious art of shoplifting. One cold day, as he and Shota are returning from a “shopping” excursion, they encounter a neglected 5-year-old, Yuri (Miyu Sasaki), and worry that she might not be warm…

KOREDE, THE PRACTICAL YOUNG nurse in Lagos, Nigeria, who serves as the narrator of Oyinkan Braithwaite’s buzzy and darkly comedic debut novel My Sister, the Serial Killer, can’t seem to signal her affections to Tade, the handsome doctor who works in her hospital. She’s unlucky in love, to be sure—but not nearly so much as the boyfriends of her beautiful younger sister Ayoola who keep turning up dead. ‘Three and they call you a serial killer.’ OYINKAN BRAITHWAITE What the police don’t know, but Korede does, is that Ayoola prefers to deliver a knife to the heart rather than risk a potential rejection. “Three and they call you a serial killer,” Korede reminds her sister, after being called yet again to help disappear the body of a bad…